Earlier this week, Bloomberg News cited unnamed sources to report layoffs were planned and could top the 5,800 job cuts in 2009, the largest ever for Microsoft. The job cuts are expected to be connected to its $7 billion acquisition of Nokia's handset unit.

Sources at Microsoft told King 5 that the running assumption is that the layoff news will come before the company holds its post-earnings conference call after the market closes July 22.

Nomura Securities analyst Rick Sherlund wrote last week that layoffs could range between 5% to 10% of the nearly 25,000 or so Nokia employees added to the nearly 100,000 Microsoft employees.

The layoffs are considered a restructuring as the company moves away from areas like Office and Windows products and into phones and mobile devices.

The cuts come as no surprise to Microsoft workers, who have been told ever since the company acquired Nokia last year that workforce reductions would be coming. Microsoft is expected to eliminate jobs in areas that overlap with Nokia, like market, software testing, and engineering. Talk of cuts come a week after Nadella sent a memo to workers, extolling a new vision for the company with laser focus on mobile and cloud computing.

Microsoft is expected to report 60 cents a share in second-quarter earnings. Sales are expected to climb 16% to $23 billion.